The Volunteer State Solar Initiative, a comprehensive solar energy and economic development program focusing on job creation, education, renewable power production, and technology commercialization was formally announced in May 2009 by Governor Bredesen and consisted of two entities: the Tennessee Solar Institute, a UT system entity located on the Knoxville campus, and the West Tennessee Solar Farm, located in Haywood County. The US Department of Energy (DOE) and the Tennessee General Assembly approved this initiative, allocating $62.5 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding to the Volunteer State Solar Initiative, which was received by the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development (ECD). The Department of Economic and Community Development contracted with the University of Tennessee system to oversee planning, operation, and management of these initiatives.
The Tennessee Solar Institute, which received an initial $23.5 million in funding, is a partnership between the University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge National Laboratory that brings together scientists, students, policy makers, and industry partners to generate transformative changes to the field of solar-generated energy production. To speed the deployment of solar alternative sources in Tennessee, the institute created the Solar Opportunity Fund to underwrite a series of Solar Installation and Innovation grants. The first grants were made in 2010.
In July 2010 the State Building Commission chose Signal Energy, of Chattanooga, to design and build the 30-acre West Tennessee Solar Farm along Interstate 40 in Haywood County, funded with an initial $31 million from American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds. Signal Energy is the renewable energy subsidiary of EMJ Corporation, general contractors. The UT Solar Institute was charged to oversee planning, operation, and management of the facility. The West Tennessee Solar Farm is located on more than 25 acres and contains a solar array of approximately twenty-one thousand fixed tilts, ground-mounted photovoltaic solar panels consisting of more than twenty thousand high efficiency silicon-based modules. The farm is capable of generating five megawatts of electricity, enough to power five hundred homes and offset the use of 250 tons of coal each month. The generated electricity is distributed through purchase agreements with local utility Chickasaw Electric Cooperative and the Tennessee Valley Authority. It is the largest solar attachment to TVA’s grid. The farm was opened in a ribbon-cutting ceremony and began producing electricity on April 12, 2012.